Center for Adaptive Rationality, Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Lentzeallee 94, 14195, Berlin, Germany.
Psychology Building, Michigan State University, 316 Physics Road, Room 255, East Lansing, MI, 48824, USA.
Psychon Bull Rev. 2018 Aug;25(4):1301-1330. doi: 10.3758/s13423-017-1369-6.
The biasing role of stereotypes is a central theme in social cognition research. For example, to understand the role of race in police officers' decisions to shoot, participants have been shown images of Black and White males and instructed to shoot only if the target is holding a gun. Findings show that Black targets are shot more frequently and more quickly than Whites. The decision to shoot has typically been modeled and understood as a signal detection process in which a sample of information is compared against a criterion, with the criterion set for Black targets being lower. We take a different approach, modeling the decision to shoot as a dynamic process in which evidence is accumulated over time until a threshold is reached. The model accounts for both the choice and response time data for both correct and incorrect decisions using a single set of parameters. Across four studies, this dynamic perspective revealed that the target's race did not create an initial bias to shoot Black targets. Instead, race impacted the rate of evidence accumulation with evidence accumulating faster to shoot for Black targets. Some participants also tended to be more cautious with Black targets, setting higher decision thresholds. Besides providing a more cohesive and richer account of the decision to shoot or not, the dynamic model suggests interventions that may address the use of race information in decisions to shoot and a means to measure their effectiveness.
刻板印象的偏差作用是社会认知研究的一个核心主题。例如,为了了解种族在警察决定开枪中的作用,参与者被展示了黑人和白人男性的图像,并被指示只有在目标持有枪支时才开枪。研究结果表明,黑人目标被射击的频率和速度都高于白人。开枪的决定通常被建模和理解为一个信号检测过程,其中一个信息样本与一个标准进行比较,而黑人目标的标准设置得更低。我们采取了一种不同的方法,将开枪的决定建模为一个动态过程,在这个过程中,证据随着时间的推移而积累,直到达到一个阈值。该模型使用一组单一的参数来解释正确和错误决策的选择和反应时间数据。在四项研究中,这种动态视角表明,目标的种族并没有对射击黑人目标产生初始偏见。相反,种族影响了证据积累的速度,对黑人目标的射击证据积累得更快。一些参与者也倾向于对黑人目标更加谨慎,设置更高的决策阈值。除了更全面、更丰富地描述是否开枪的决策外,动态模型还提出了一些干预措施,这些干预措施可能会解决在决定开枪时使用种族信息的问题,并提供衡量其效果的方法。